Go TeamC/A
Title: Of Demony Things and Crappy Lifetimes
Author: Frazi
Posted: REWORK! 20 Feb 2006
Rating: R
Category: AU, Humor
Content: Aus/C
Summary: Just a what if Angelus had been chipped instead of Spike and Cordy found him What can I say? Was bored.
Spoilers: Hmmm....can't think of any.... (BtVS 3)
Disclaimer: The characters in the Angelverse were created by Joss Whedon & David Greenwalt. No infringement is intended, no profit is made.
Distribution: By all means just tell me where? Stranger Things/GT is a given.
Author's Squawk: This was originally a stand alone I think a year or so ago. I don't know what happened. It ran away with me. Now its like 112 pages and I'm posting it as a serial. I've been gone long. I know. Please don't hate me. But at least I'm back with a bang....er... I hope. Heheh. Missed you guys. Fer real!
Thanks/Dedication:
Feedback:Like breathing air.
CHAPTER 1“Oh this is just great. Perfect.” The brunette trudged through the wet puddles of the sidewalk; her black dress stained and drenched, her suede heels ruined as she stumbled into another rain-induced puddle.
In the wee hours of the morning, Cordelia Chase squinted up at the flickering sign of the Bronze. Two hours before dawn- before reality would take shape and she would have to admit that she was no longer a Chase; but a homeless, penniless, gutless piece of crap. And still she hadn’t been able to look at the wretched Cordettes’ in the face and tell them that she had no home to go back to, no money to call the cab and no guts to tell them to their face that she didn’t want to leave the sanctity of the Bronze.
But she didn’t say that.
And so now here she was with her coat and purse clutched in one hand and the edge of her dress in another as she began her first almost morning of being worth shit. “Where’s a vampire when you need one?”
Walking to car, she threw her bag and coat into the backseat before dropping into the driver’s seat. And then she caught the dial of her fuel gauge. “ARGH!” Smacking sting of her palms on the steering wheel didn’t hurt as much as the realization that fifteen minutes later when the party inside would breakup, she’d still be sitting here. And her lovely spineless exit from her so-called friends would be worth very little.
“Okay Chase.” She took a deep breath, her hands gripping the wheel for strength. “Breathe, step out and let’s walk.” Picking up her coat she left her empty purse in the backseat and kicked the door of her car shut. It along with everything she owned was going to be repossessed anyway. Where could she have driven it?
Hating the way her heels were soaked and dreading the long walk to a house that wasn’t going to be there in the morning, she shrugged into her coat and proceeded to map the sidewalk for the first time in her life. “Could this suck any more?”
And that was when she heard the crash and a strangled cry of pain.
Freezing in her tracks, her arms wrapped tightly around her, she dug into her pocket for the water pistol that Willow had handed her as a joke. She hoped the fact that it was filled with holy water wasn’t a joke as she stared into the dark alley.
“Okay whatever you are, I’m armed and dangerous.” There was a guttural groan before she made out the silhouette of a man struggling against the trashcan almost as if his legs didn’t hold him up.
Maybe it was just another homeless person who’d lost their parents and fortune all in one night: another riches to rags story. Then she winced when the grip he had on the trashcan slipped and he landed in a very large puddle with a splash and a snarl of pain that sent shivers down her back.
Even as she was taking the first step towards the sprawled form she was wondering about the sanity of her decision. She blamed the Scoobies for this stupid need to suddenly help if she could and her bravado on the fact that she had very little left to lose. “Hey are you okay?”
“Do I look okay?”
The rich timbre of his voice was laced with pain and as he shifted in the slight glow from the streetlamp across the road, she couldn’t see his face as she stood there a few feet away from him. In the slash of light she could see black pants soaked with muddy rainwater and blood, and hands slashed and purple as they clutched a very nasty gash across a chest that barely held the old black shirt that might have, at one point, been very expensive silk. “You look like shit.”
“Tactless candor suits you brighteyes.” The retort would have been effective had it not been punctuated with the hiss of pain.
Her grip tightened on her little water pistol when she noticed two things. His chest didn’t rise and fall with his moans of pain only when he shifted and the black pants she’d noticed were leather. “What stroke of unbelievable luck. Of all the things to run into at this time of the night! A wounded vampire who’s probably also hungry. If it’s all the same to you, I’ll be going now. Hope you make it.” She turned to walk out of the alley.
“Chase, the least you can do is open the fucking manhole and give a vampire a fighting chance.” Her heels skidded to a stop when she finally realized why the husk of his voice was so familiar and why he knew her name.
Turning very slowly while she took a step back, she met amber eyes of one Angelus the Scourge of Europe; and Buffy’s latest dilemma. When she caught the distinct sparkle of fangs her jaw hardened. “Awww, looks like the slayer got you good this time. What did you drag yourself here for? To let her lick your wounds?”
“Sure Chase. Kick a demon when he’s down.” She crossed her arms; slightly content in the sluggish movement of his muscles and the apparent beating he’d received.
“You don’t play the damsel in distress very well, Angelus. A little more on the pleading side might help.” The soft growl was tinged with a waver of a painful swallow.
“I have a reputation, little girl.” She shrugged.
“Fitting end I’d think. Scourge of Europe gets his tushi kicked by a girl slayer he happens to dote on and greets the sun.” She whirled around to leave.
“Cordelia.” The desperate edge to her name made her pause.
What the hell was she thinking? She couldn’t actually be considering helping him. He was a vampire. An eater of people. A soulless demon with sex and pain on the brain. So then why the hell was she still standing there with her back to the bruised and broken vampire and not just walking home like she should have? With her foot tapping on the wet pavement she grit her teeth. Damn the Scooby idiots! She whirled around and glared at him.
“What? Do you really expect me to help you? YOU the pillager of innocents and mauler of women?”
“Jesus-fucking-Christ Chase, do I look like I can do either right now!”
“No, you look like you should die. Between you killing me and you burning in hell; which ever shall I chose? Happy incineration, Angelus.”
“I’ll give you my word!” She snorted a dry laugh catching in her throat.
“Oh my god!” She feigned shock. “I so believe you now.” She glared at him. “The most I can do right now is to march to the nearest phone booth and call the slayer to finish the job and put you out of your misery.”
There was a defeated sigh and she frowned at him for a second. Then he spoke. “Are you going to open the manhole or not?”
“And that will save your pathetic life?”
“It will give me a chance to maybe try!”
“You’re evil. You should die.” The vampire let out an exasperated breath.
“Oh for…I AM dying! If I was able to pillage or maul anything right now you’d be calling me master!” He winced when he shifted again against the wall of the alley.
And again she thought. With a last cry of frustration, she pocketed her little water pistol and stalked towards the manhole some good ten feet away from the sprawled vampire and grabbed the latch with a grunt. “I cannot believe I am doing this!”
There was a chuckle from the other side as she grunted and groaned before pulling it aside. Huffing with effort she hitched her fists on her waist and watched him struggling to his knees. She bit her lip as she saw his legs waver with weakness, his arms shaking with the effort to push himself to his feet.
“Now give me a minute to use my tongue to crawl towards it, because my limbs are fucking rubber.”
Closing her eyes she let out a deep breath. “You are so pathetic.” Heels clicking purposefully she trudged up the vampire with a death glare and grabbed his arm.
His head swiveled to the side and he stared up at her, the muscles in his neck taut with strain and twitching with pain. And she saw his face for the first time.
Cordelia’s mouth dropped open with a gasp as she saw the heavy trail of blood from his temple to his jaw, the flesh around his temples burnt and opened with what looked like a jagged razor. This did not look like the work of the slayer.
“Fuck.” She couldn’t hold the shocked profanity as Angelus struggled to keep his weight on his hands and knees, his head falling back to bow between his shoulders. “What the hell happened to you?”
A muscle in his jaw worked as he stretched on hand up and grabbed the edge of the garbage can and instinctively she caught his shoulder and helped him get to his feet. Again his eyes snapped up to her with surprise and she looked at the bruises on his face and the blood drenching his shirt in wonder. This could so not be Buffy’s work. She saw his muddied forehead crease with a frown.
“What happened to letting me greet the sun?”
“You know I didn’t think anyone was worse off than me right now, but I concede to you. You look like shit.”
“Already said that.” He growled at the blinding pain in his broken leg and the stretch of tendons on ribs he knew were cracked. He watched the girl’s hazel eyes take inventory of his injuries and kept himself from leaning towards her lest he startle her and she leave him here in a heap.
“So you planning on helping me reach the manhole tonight because I forgot my sun block.” He could have sworn he saw the corner of her mouth lift slightly as she gingerly took firm hold of his upper arm.
Unwittingly, she ducked her shoulders and his arm fell around her as he finally managed to put his weight on his good leg and stand for the first time that evening.
“If I didn’t have a death wish not five minutes ago, I’d be scared witless, but nothing can faze me now. So tell me? This doesn’t look like Bluffy the vampire layer’s work.”
Instinctively Angelus’ nostrils flared with the smell of human blood, but after his night, he decided not to test the theory again. She looked about as human as they came. “I got ensnared.” He growled as he hobbled with her weight fighting the urge to feed, knowing if he tried he’d die sooner. “A couple of commando wannabes got the jump on me. Two nights go.”
She looked up startled. “You got ensnared by an army? No wonder you look like death.”
He cried out softly nearly howling with the agonizing pain in his ribs when she shifted his weight and she stopped watching the flying colors of pain streak across his previously handsome face. “Okay, let’s just get it out in the open already. I’ve had enough surprises this evening. Why aren’t you trying to eat me?”
He met her eyes, squinting his left eye to clear the vision with his right almost sealed shut with swelling. “Sounded too much like a request on your part, Chase.”
“Do you ever try straight answers Scourgey?”
He sighed wincing when he couldn’t prompt her to move further. The inquisitive glitter in her hazel eyes was insatiable and she was stubborn as hell; that much he knew from his run-ins with their little clan. “I can’t.”
“Because you love me?”
He couldn’t hold the scowl and the tightening of his muscles as he glared down at her. “I suck face with a slayer and now suddenly everything thinks I’m fucking love’s bitch.”
She didn’t muffle a sardonic snicker as her lips twisted up into a half smile, half smirk. “Duh.”
He glared down at her wishing he could rip out her tongue and made her eat it, but wishing did not make it so. So instead he shoved her away, causing her to stumble away and him to fall heavily against the alley wall, his leg trembling under the weight of his body as he gripped the brick behind him his game face slipping on in agonized frustration.
“I can’t bite you! I can’t fucking bite anyone! The reason I look like death is because I’ve been in the real life equivalent of hell on earth! The commando shits-for-brains put something in my head and now I can’t fucking kill or maim anything! Okay!”
Both her eyebrows shot up at the screamed admission and she took a minute to let the news settle. “Have you tried?”
“Oh for!” He let out an infuriated snarl as he stared up at the lightening sky and cursed profusely.
With a roll of her eyes, she sighed. “I’ll take that as a yes.” Then she grabbed his arm again. “Come on, you big baby. You’re not the only vampire that’s fangless. Remember Angel?” He growled before leaning against her, unable to help himself from accepting this stupid little human’s help because staying alive was a higher priority than his life right now.
“Me. He was still fucking me! The damned sun seems appealing right now.” Cordelia marveled at her stupidity as she began the slow journey to the parking lot of the Bronze again, this time aiding one very deranged, hungry and wounded vampire sniffing her neck and she wondered what the hell she was thinking.
“Well I bet the Scooby gang would just love to hear about this and Buggy won’t be happy if she finds out I let her boyfriend turn to dust. You’re coming home with me until she comes to take you in the morning.”
“You mean stake me in the morning.”
“Whatever rocks your rocks, now shut up before I drop you here, you’re not exactly light.”
Silence. Calculated steps. Then. “I’m not fat Chase.”
CHAPTER 2
“YOU BROUGHT HOME WHO?”
Cordelia winced holding the phone away from her ear as Angelus lay sprawled on the kitchen counter, the blinds on the windows were closed and in the florescent lights of her kitchen, the deathly still vampire looked very much like the walking corpse that he was. She sighed and decided a different tactic with the screaming on the phone. She’d seen the state of the vampire and decided to call the cavalry earlier. He didn’t look like he’d make it through the night.
“Giles, it took me almost two excruciating hours to drag him here. Believe me, stupid I am not. He really can’t seem to bite me and he really is in bad shape.” She watched Angelus try and take off the tattered remains of his shirt. “Besides, he’s three sheets to the wind with hunger and blood loss and keeps raving about this Initiative group.”
“IT’S ANGELUS FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!”
“Are you going to keep shouting, Librarian man, because believing me I WILL hang up on you.” She raised an eyebrow when Angelus let out a very undignified squeak.
“ANGELUS!? OF ALL PEOPLE!”
And she hit disconnect on her cordless before staring at it nonchalantly. She counted to three softly in her head before the phone rang again. After four bells she picked up. “Chase residence, Cordelia Chase speaking.”
There was a throat being cleared on the other side. “What do you need?”
“You and some very large Band-Aids. Also something for him to eat, he hasn’t fed in a week, he says.” She grabbed the edge of Angelus’ shirt and pulled. The beaten, already slashed silk tore easily and Angelus let out a hiss of pain. She admonished him with a roll of her eyes before chucking the remains of his shirt into the trash.
“And he’s not even TRIED to bite you.”
The brunette rolled her eyes as she walked around the prone body of the groaning vampire. “Hello! Fangless vampire here! Were you NOT listening before?” Facing Angelus she met his pain laced eyes. “The pants will have to go too.”
“CORDELIA! He’s undressing!?!?!”
She let out another lamenting sigh. “Do you want me hang up again?”
“Lord! No. Don’t. I can’t get through to Buffy at the moment. Willow’s parents were in town; she’s with her.” Cordelia watching Angelus struggle with the leather pants and took pity on him.
Reaching out she deftly unbuckled his belt and nearly screamed when his hand caught her wrist. Shocked hazel eyes drifted up to his face and she frowned at him as he looked at her with gritted teeth and stormy obsidian eyes.
“What?” She mouthed while Giles talked.
A scarred eyebrow arched, his mouth twisting into a cocky half smile.
Her eyes widened as she jerked her hand out of his grasp, her cheeks flaming. Gives a whole new meaning to commando, this one; she concluded, her own eyes mapping the curves of his ass once before turning away.
“Cordelia?”
Clearing her throat she stepped away from the deliriously smirking vampire and addressed Giles on the phone. “Yeah Giles. I’m here.”
“I’ll be there in an hour.”
“Good.” She hung up and turned to finally regard the bruised and battered dead man on her kitchen counter. “Okay. So what shall we do till then? How about a game of poker?”
He stared at her incredulously. “Sweetheart I suggest you fetch a pair of pliers and get these bullets out of me before I turn to dust on your nice clean kitchen floor.”
She let out a snort of breath. “That drunk I’m not.”***
She’d gone from a penniless May Queen to vampire nurse in training.
“You’re pulling it!”
“Will you PLEASE just NOT talk?”
“You’re dislocating my solar plexus woman! Do you really expect me sit back quietly!”
“Do you KNOW how many bullets were in here?”
“ARGH! THAT was my liver you just poked!”
The brunette sat back on his thighs, her weight making him wince as she sat atop him while the vampire lay on her kitchen table. Her hands were soaked in his blood. She had agreed to get the bullets out of his body to give it a chance to heal. Even though the sight of blood was making her squeamish, the heavy amount of liquor she’d been consuming since the call to Giles had steadied her nerves. It didn’t seem to work on the vampire though. Pointing the blood soaked tweezers into his face, she glared.
“Do you or do you NOT want me to do this for you?” Angelus’ entire body was humming with pain. The insane need to feed was making him delirious and the alcohol in his veins wasn’t helping.
Besides this little girl was stubborn and uncharacteristically brutal when she was tipsy. At first he’d thought it would be a good idea to get her to relax before she tried her hand at helping him, seeing as the watcher wouldn’t be there sooner. He couldn’t risk infection. The bullets had been there the entire day yesterday. Besides the lack of feeding wasn’t helping his healing.
“This is fucking unacceptable! Can you at least TRY not to rearrange my internal organs?”
“Do I look like your surgeon, Angelus?” She grabbed the blood stained bottle of whiskey she’d found in her father’s study and took a swig, nearly toppling off the kitchen counter. “Ooo, I’m a fairy princess.”
The vampire gritted his teeth before he grabbed the bottle away from her. “Think you’ve had enough Chase.”
Cordelia shook her head to clear the sudden haze before her eyes before she blinked at him. “The bullets are out. It’s not my fault your blood is abnormally thick. I couldn’t see anything.”
“Surprising considering where your hands landed…” He winced as he shifted on the flat marble top before draining the last few gulps of the whiskey.
“How was I supposed to know your spleen is supposed to be there? If I’d paid that much attention in Bio 101, I might have been Cordelia Chase Nerd Slayer instead!” Angelus let his head fall back against the cold marble and sighed. “Fuck, just finish the bandaging.”
Cordelia huffed as she cleaned the excess blood from his wounds before taping him up with medical tape and securing his bandage.
“You’re just lucky we had a First Aid kit and you’re even luckier I knew were it was.” She watched his eyelids drop shut and frowned slightly.
“Are you dying?” There was a distinct growl in his chest, but it was too soft for her liking. “You can’t die you big lump of rotting brain! I didn’t half carry you here to let you turn to dust. Think of the cleaning bill and I’m broke!” Grabbing the languid sway of his jaw she shook him. “Hey! Wake up Fangless! You’re not dying on me! You hear that! Wake up now or I’ll paint your toes pink!”
Angelus dragged on eye open between the bright lights exploding behind his closed lids and the screaming voices in his head. He watched bright hazel eyes watching him with something that looked like concern, her fingers securing the bandage over his forehead.
She glared down at him, a dull fear settling in her belly, the alcohol in her system dampening her defenses as she panicked at the prospect of him actually dying. She *so* didn’t want his death on her hands. She knew she’d get the blame eventually. Cordelia realized she should have just left him there in the stupid alley instead! That way, she could have just gone on with her lack of life and left Sunnydale in the middle of the night like she originally planned.
“Listen to me Angelus, I’m covered in vampire goo! I ruined a perfectly nice Perry Ellis dress, if you make all that in vain I will come after you in hell, believe me, I’m that depressed to try!” The dilated pupils shifted and she realized at least he was partially coherent.
“I’m going to get you some painkillers, I don’t know if they will work, but hey; desperate times. Don’t go away.” His tongue slid out to wet his dry lips and she took that as a yes before sprinting out of the kitchen.
Her mother took the strongest pills in the world. If they could work on her migraines, they sure as hell would be able to hold of a vampire for a while until Giles came back. She was riffling through her mother’s drawers when the sound of barking startled her.
Then her eyes widened.
“Oh shit! SAMSON!” Screeching down the stairs, she hoped the dog had not made it into the kitchen. It would so not look good telling Giles her dog ate Angelus. “Samson, don’t!”
***
Angelus was propped up on the floor leaning against the cabinet under the sink while Cordelia sat on the stool, her head cradled on blood soaked arms, and that was how Giles found them.
Freezing in the archway of the brightly lit, white tiled kitchen Giles almost reeled. He was too late. “Cordelia?”
“I am still an Armani privilege member!” The brunette’s head snapped up, one finger pointed up amidst her fashion nightmare and the shock of falling back to earth. She blinked disoriented before meeting his gaze with lassitude. “Giles?”
He silently thanked god he hadn’t eaten breakfast, the sight of the kitchen would have made him lose it. Rushing to her side, Giles watched the vampire sitting there a few feet away; his head leaned back against the cabinet, his eyes closed. He swallowed thickly, trying to keep the bile down his throat. “What happened?”
“Angelus ate my dog.”
Moist hazel eyes looked up at Giles and the watcher took in the blood stained floor, the prone Doberman and the very still vampire before gathering Cordelia in his arms. Why couldn’t things be slightly normal for a change? Every time Giles looked at these kids, he realized how young they were. They deserved so much better. “Cordelia?”
“Hmmm?”
“Where is your furniture?”
“Tip of the iceberg, Librarian man. There’s more.”
CHAPTER 3Cordelia sat on the flush watching Giles secure the last of the chains on the vampire as he was tied into the bathtub. “Is this a popular theme with you, Giles? The bathtub I mean?”
The watcher sighed. “There aren’t any other chairs or tables in the house Cordelia if you recall. Besides, this is the only room without windows considering you don’t have curtains.”
“Oh right. I’m broke. Kinda forget that every time.” Rupert Giles straightened before he looked down at the slumping brunette sitting on the closed toilet seat.
“What happened? Where are your parents?”
“Wallowing in Barbados from what I’m told. See that little bit of information I found out at six in the morning when those tax and debt collectors started playing with my doorbell.” She waved an indifferent hand, her mind a blur with images. “Woke up to accusations, threats and demands. Not the perfect way to start a day I tell you.”
Noticing the startling clarity in her hazel eyes despite the amount of alcohol this girl has consumed, Giles was filled with panic and concern. “They left you?”
“Pfft!” The brunette snorted bitterly. “No they’d left long before. They just never came back.”
The older man allowed himself a moment of fury at the prospect of her parents sitting under beach umbrella while their teenage daughter was dragged into the gutter, but the girl had been through enough tonight.
“Cordelia, why don’t you take a shower? And then maybe I’ll see if I can find something for you to eat. It’ll give us something to do until Angelus wakes up.” A yawn caught Cordelia off guard before she frowned, as she regarded the dead man in their guest bedroom bathtub.
He lay there, like a marble statue, lifeless and not breathing. But already she could tell the wounds were healing at the expense of her very expensive Doberman. In Angelus’ drunken stupor and between his growling at her medical skills he’d managed to piece together his entire experience with this Initiative group. The starvation, the torture, and the experiments. She felt a certain amount of incredulity that she could feel sympathy for this monster. But then sympathy was all she had left.
“Who are these people Giles? I’m not in the slayer’s loop, not that I ever wanted to be, but he was supposed to be the strongest; master vampire and blah blah; right?” She blinked up at the watcher. “Just makes me wonder, if they can do this to Angelus; I hope they’re on our side.”
“So do I Cordelia.” Putting a gentle hand on her shoulder, he tried a reassuring smile. “You should get cleaned up.”
She ran her gaze once over the sleeping vampire before standing and stretching. “Vamp-sitting shift is officially changing.” She offered him a rather wobbly smile. “I better take that shower, before the water goes.”
She was almost out of the room when Giles called out, “Cordelia?”
Looking over her shoulder she met curious brown eyes behind the glistening spectacles.
“Why did you save him?”
And she’d been asking herself that exact same question all night. “I don’t know. Seemed like the only option at the time.” She frowned slightly, more to herself. “Weird, huh?”
The watched looked back at the silent vampire as Cordelia left. “Most definitely.” From previous experience, he knew Cordelia Chase was never the kind of girl who put her life on the line for a lot of people.
In one night, she’d managed to rescue a crazed vampire, drag him to cover before dawn, administered first aid and managed to keep herself alive in the process. This wasn’t the girl he’d seen walk out of her last Scooby meeting. What had changed between then and now?
Rupert Giles liked answers and so far, he was only accumulating questions. Picking up a bag of blood he’d purchased on his way over, he held the vampire’s chin and poured it down his throat.
***
It was almost afternoon when Cordelia finally made it downstairs into the study. She felt stronger and more in control; the pep talk she’d given herself in the shower still echoing in her head. She didn’t need anyone. She was Cordelia Chase.
From the suitcase she’d packed of the belongs she could call her own, Cordelia had picked out her white tennis shorts and a soft gray t-shirt and brushed her damp hair straight and away from her face. What she wouldn’t do for a hairdryer right now. She blinked at Giles sitting on the white bathroom floor, his head against the wall as he snored.
Hiding a smile she perched back on the toilet seat and noticed the four empty bags of blood. So now he was also fed. Suddenly they’d gone from fighting these creeplings to nursing them; all because she’d managed to get one home. Now that she was cleaned and slightly sober, she wondered what the hell had she been thinking.
But then there was something about the desolate loss in his gold rimmed eyes that had matched her own. Like losing your life. Or worse. Your religion.
“Have a nice bath?”
She nodded as Giles’ weary question before asking hers. “You called the slayer?”
“I left her a message on her voicemail I believe.”
“Call her back.”
The watcher blinked. “Pardon?”
She turned to him with icy hazel eyes. “Call her back Giles and tell her not to come here. I don’t want her to see me this way. None of them.”
“Cordelia…”
She raised her hand before looking away. “Pity, I don’t want. I had this planned. I was supposed to be on a bus to LA as we speak, on my way to an acting career and new life of fame and fortune. He was never a part of it, but I bet God is laughing his ass off now at the joke that is my life. Well God has another thing coming.” She looked back with resolve etched across her beautiful face.
“No catastrophic life altering plan is keeping me here Giles and no one follows me. That was the plan. I go without notice and never look back. Well, maybe to brag once in a while to people that shall remain unnamed for trying to break Cordelia Chase. Besides that,” she stood purposefully, “I’m gone.” There was the reference again.
His eyes narrowed behind his glasses. Something had happened. Something he was not aware of. “Where will you go?”
She shrugged. “There’s bound to be an acting agent out there looking for a beautiful fresh face.”
“How will you find one?”
“They have yellow pages; don’t they?”
The man sighed before standing. “Cordelia, there are reasons for everything that happens in your life.”
The brunette looked up with a frown. “Oh please don’t.” She held up a hand and rolled her eyes. “Don’t lecture me. I’ve done it alone all this time Librarian-man; believe me I can do this.”
“You didn’t catch that bus for a reason.”
“One who calls himself Angelus; yeah. I know. I was there,” she shot back the acidic retort before letting out an exasperated breath. “Look, just call the slayer.”
“Buffy.”
“Whatever!” She snapped, her anger getting the best of her as she glared at him. “Call her and tell her not to come just yet. I’ll be packed and out of here in an hour. Then you can go save the world or whatever.” When soft compelling hands caught her shoulders, it was almost hell not to wrench away or throw herself into his arms, but he was one of them. They’d only laugh. He hadn’t; but it was a matter of time. “Let me go Giles.”
“Cordelia.” She finally met his eyes, only to blink at the understanding in the place of the pity she was expecting. “I’ll call her back, but only to tell her to meet us at my house. You cannot just get up and go to LA like that and alone no less.”
“Yes I can.”
“Cordelia be reasonable.”
Crossing her arms she stood there, with the stubborn line of her body and her eyes not meeting his. “Sorry, but sense and reason left when I lost my life Giles. Now all I have is me.”
“You aren’t alone.”
“Yes I am.” Giles resisted the urge to reach out and physically shake the woman out of her mulish state.
If she was worried about breaking, shutting herself away wasn’t going to help. And the lack of emotional response on the woman worried him more than her need to distance herself from her previous life.
“No you aren’t!” When her brow and spine stiffened at his sharp rebuttal he softened his tone. “Come home with me. I have a friend in LA. He has contacts. Let me at the least help you settle down and give you a few names. You can’t just pack up and take a bus to a new life Cordelia; these things take time.”
“Charity…”
“IT is NOT charity!” He held her firmly, without letting her avert her gaze. “You are my student. You have been someone who I care for as much as I care for all my other students. I will not let you put yourself in harms way and I will, at the same time, not be in your way. Just take a little time and let’s plan this properly.”
Every notion and defense she’d made in her head seemed to crumble slowly and steadily as the man held her in place. She’d convinced herself that she could make it. She’d do it on her own. She’d find a way. She was Cordelia Chase. Now here he was standing there telling her she wasn’t alone and she was supposed to just shut up and take it like a good little girl.
Why did they always seem to dictate life to everything in Sunnydale? Slutty Buffy, cheating Xander and opportunist little Willow! Now they had the watcher telling her what to do.
“I’m not telling anyone I’m penniless Giles. I’ve had enough traumas to last me a lifetime.” The line of her shoulder was still distrustful.
“I won’t say a word.” Stepping away he gave enough personal space to reassure herself that he wasn’t pushing her into any decision, but he just couldn’t bear the thought of letting the young woman lose herself in the dirty little alleyways of LA.
She might not have been the greatest Scooby, but she was a part of them for a while and she was as innocent as the rest. “We’ll tell them your parents sold the estate to buy a place in LA and when you have an agent, a place to go and a job to support you; you can leave and no one has to know.”
No. The word whispered through the young woman’s head until she grit her teeth and averted her gaze. Looking at he helpless vampire, who couldn’t feed himself anymore. The fangless, defenseless creature needed them and by some sick twist of fate, she was still here in Sunnyhell between people who took her life from her to begin with. Looking up she regarded the silent man for a moment before letting out a sigh and rolling her eyes.
“Fine. I’ll shack over at your place until I’ve caught my bearing.” At the visible relief on his face she pointed her finger at him. “Remember this is temporary Giles. You aren’t keeping me. And I’m only saying that so you can’t say I didn’t warn you. I’m very likable. Don’t get attached.”
He smiled. “I shall practice restraint.” Just because she accepted help didn’t mean she trusted him or anyone else. If she was offered free room and board until she had her path clear, who was she to argue?
At least that’s what she told herself.
***
It had been a slow progression from her house to the car with one wrapped dead body between two people, one of which was still worried about her nails.
And from across the hood of Giles car Cordelia had let her eyes run over the white pillars of the house she’d been born into, the safe walls that kept the monsters out, the garden she’s played in as a child and the driveway where she’d backed up her mother’s Jag into a tree when she was eleven. The memories, the moments and the security hadn’t been wrenched away until that moment when she stood outside the huge wrought iron gates that were closed to her forever. Along with the sanctity of calling some place her home.
And even in the old man’s company, Cordelia felt like she was the loneliest person alive. Or dead.
Now she stood there while Giles dragged the wrapped vampire across the living room and into the bathroom as she placed her suitcase at the foot of his stairs and surveyed the little den with listless interest. Couch. TV. Books. That was all there was to Giles’s most lived-in room.
He walked up to her dusting his hands and wincing at the pulled muscle in his back. “I’m too old for this.” His smile was accommodating and Cordelia tried not to think it was ‘too’ accommodating. He had invited her into his home. She couldn’t trust him, but she didn’t have to hate him. “Would you like something to eat?” When a yawn caught her by surprise he smiled. “Or you could catch up on some sleep.”
Flopping into the couch the girl took a deep breath. “Mind if I hog your couch?”
He shook his head before pulling off his coat. “Mi casa es su casa.” He hung it up in the hall closet. “I’ll put on some tea and rest for a bit. You sure you’ll be alright on the sofa?”
But the girl was already sprawled across its length her head on her folded arms and her mouth open as she lay there. Asleep.